How to: DIY Wedge Camper

Damn! That is expensive AF. A local shop quoted me $600 for materials and the CNC cutting.

 

Maybe call a store outside your area and see if they can ship it out. At those prices it might be cheaper.

 

Those of you who haven't started building or are thinking about it. I have been logging my costs, including tools. I had to purchase grinders, a welder, and a sewing machine as well as all the things like a welding mask, clear safety shield (cutoff wheels are scary yo), welding gloves, brushes, etc etc.

Cost of tools is about $800 (harbor freight FTW), and so far it's looking like I will be around $3300 for all materials for a 6ft bed version with the doors and panels CNC cut by a local shop. So all in going from basically zero tools needed to build, to having all you need and acquiring some badass skills, about $4100.

 

I called Signarama in orlando and they quoted me at $75 for a 4x8 of 3mm aluminum composite and $125 or 150 for the 5x10. They do have a location in Santa Clarita, thats SoCal, right?

I picked up the flux core welder and safety gear form HF, not their $100 welder but the green one, was $160 I think with coupon. All of the other stuff I have and I found $250 worth of home depot gift cards waiting for me to redeem from my credit card so guess who is buying an Evolution Rage 3 saw for cutting all the steel... aww yeah I love new tools

I'm hoping to come in around 3-4k for mine. so far I have spent $150 to get the bed mount brackets fabricated, probably could have done a group run of them to get the price down... can still probably do that if anyone is interested

 

What welder did you go with? And how did it work? Pinged the anything welding thread and they suggested a hobart and gas, so all said and done that is like 800 alone for the welder setup with safety gear. Its cool to have a welder, but just hard to spend that kinda money for something Ill use probably this one time.

 

That is super expensive. I think my quote was less than 400 with cutting.

 

it usually has a coupon to bring the price down. plus my store had one on their mark down table that was a return for $125. everything was there, someone probably did the old wal mart rental program with it.

for this frame you really do not need a mig welder, you could do it with a stick welder if you're good with stick. I recently welded some end table legs using the same type of tube steel for the camper with the easy flux on my 110v outlet in my garage... no issues and got perfect penetration. youll have some extra clean up and prep for flux core but for $200 / 300 maybe with gear and safety stuff it will work

 

you guys need friends with big CNCs.... Join a local makerspace or create one like I did (makerFX.org...shameless plug).... you'l find all sorts of new friends with expensive tools you didnt know you needed

mentioned on our makerspaces slack that I need help cutting something with at least a 4x8 cnc and I had to members with access to 5x10s at their work say bring the stuff over..

 

Nice, Yea I've also been keeping a log on prices, still around the low to mid 3000's.

Damn I'm jealous.
I have some friends down there so maybe I'll make a trip.

I picked up the titanium 170 from HF openbox.
I had the little flux welder but I couldn't get it to weld how I wanted to.
Also have a TIG, but that would've taken forever lol.

If you have the money for it @2ski4life7 I'd reccomend a dual voltage MIG welder.

 

Why do that when you could pay GFC $6000+ and just kick back and wait a year for it to arrive? /s

 

I was thinking the hobart 140 and getting gas.

 

For me personally it's been a fun project during the quarantine.
Also, didn't like a few aspects of the GFC that I was able to change to my liking.
Saving 3K plus the waiting time was an added bonus.

 

thats a solid welder, cant go wrong with it.

 

That /s meant I was being sarcastic. I totally dig the project. I'm a huge advocate of using money to pay for tools and learn skills where possible instead of paying for someone to do everything do me. I will likely tackle this build at some point.

 

Ah right on.
Learn something new everyday lol

 

Yeah, I've been following along here and doing research. I want to do this as well during hte winter.

 

Yeah and get something that isn't custom to your wants and needs and has failing hinges! /s Lol


The welder I used is the Harbor Freight Titanium 125 flux core. No gas, super small and 110v which was awesome. Plus it was $179 on sale. I am actually very impressed and it welds better than I could have expected for the cost. A lot of my welds that won't be getting ground down look quite good for a newbie.

No need for a gas setup on this project, especially if you don't have one, flux core will do just fine. Lot of people hate on flux core but that is what most use for fieldwork and large structural repairs outdoors.

 

Lol that being said.. their new hinges they're using look really cool.

Yea no hate on flux I just don't have much experience with it and kept burning through the tubes.
Only really used Mig and Tig before but everyone who uses that little green machine seems to love it.,

 

I had issues with burn through initially and it took a good bit of messing around to get the welder settings right, but once I set them, I haven't had to touch it the whole project and my welding at this point is basically all wrapped up. Some day I may upgrade, but I think the next purchase is a plasma cutter before a new welder.

 

what aluminum thickness panel are people using? The local shop to me is using E-panel and the skin portion is 0.008" in thick which looks to be thicker than MaxMetal (0.006"), the only thing thicker looks to be dibond, but more spendy.